Mancubus



The mancubus (plural: mancubi) is a large and formidable monster shambling about on sturdy, stumpy elephant-like legs, glaring at opponents through hateful green eyes, while dribbling the remains of its victims from a lusting mouth, displaying sharp yellow fangs. To make things worse, its arms have been replaced by huge s capable of spouting a rapid series of scathing bursts of flame, which are powered by a pair of fuel tanks grafted onto the obese monster's back. The game manual describes the mancubus as follows: "The only good thing about fatso is that he's a nice wide target. Good thing, because it takes a lot of hits to puncture him. He pumps out fireballs like there was no tomorrow.".

This monstrous creature makes its first appearance in MAP07: Dead Simple of Doom II, where the player is forced to fight them to break through a fortified area controlled by the enemy.

Tactical analysis
A mancubus will make a gurgling/snorting sound that crescendos into a monstrous tiger-like roar when spotting a player. The mancubus is a dangerous opponent, but has a number of exploitable weaknesses. It is slow and makes a large target, so is easy to kill with rapid-fire weapons. The rocket launcher is possibly the most effective weapon against the mancubus. Furthermore, because it will pause briefly before attacking, giving out a distinctive battle cry before firing, it is easy to prevent the attacking using slower weapons to stun, even the super shotgun. When a mancubus does attack, it is helpful to attempt to keep one's distance. Otherwise, the player might take two fireballs instead of just one. When dodging from a greater distance, it is important to avoid over-dodging. With the first two attacks from the mancubus, one fireball will go straight toward the player while the other will fly off diagonally to the other side (to the player's right, then to the player's left); in the third volley, one will go left and one right. This pattern can be figured out and used to avoid mancubus attacks.

Once a mancubus has begun to attack its target, it continues to fire (if it remains unhurt while firing) until all three bursts have been discharged, even if the target has moved out of its sight. This characteristic of their attack can be abused to cause monster infighting.

When killed, it lets out a low-pitched exhale of air as its head is split in two. Its body then begins to slowly divide in half, unleashing deluges of blood, until all that remains are folds of ripped flesh, bloody ribs, and its eyes spilling out onto two disembodied fireball launchers. This is quite possibly the goriest death sequence of any regular, non-gibbed enemy.

Data
Data not listed is the same as for the original version.




 * 1) This table assumes that all calls to P_Random for damage, pain chance, impact animations, and backfire checks are consecutive. In real play, this is never the case: counterattacks and AI pathfinding must be handled, and of course the map may contain additional moving monsters and other randomized phenomena (such as flickering lights). Any resulting errors are probably toward the single-shot average, as they introduce noise into the correlation between the indices of "consecutive" calls.
 * 2) Assumes that direct hits are possible, which does not occur in any stock map.
 * 3) Hardcoded exception to infighting negates damage (excepting indirect damage caused by exploding barrels).

Appearance statistics
In the IWADs the mancubus is first encountered on these maps per skill level:

The IWADs contain the following numbers of mancubi per skill level:

Of the maps covered on the Doom Wiki, the following have the highest numbers of mancubi in single-player: This data was last verified on June 16, 2023.

Doom 64
While their function in Doom 64 is unchanged, their appearance is greatly altered. They have less fat and a more bear-like face, have horns, are taller and wear a metal body harness. Their fireballs are smaller and appear more like fiery brimstone.

This type of mancubus appears on the cover of an issue of Nintendo Power featuring a spread of Doom 64, including a two-page poster that features it in conjunction with other demons.

Doom RPG
In Doom RPG, the mancubus appears as a class of monster. There are three variations, identified by color:
 * Behemoth (blue with red eyes)
 * Mancubus (normal colors)
 * Druj (red)

This monster class is weak against rockets.